Of Tagliatelle Pasta and Hickeys
by theyellowumbrella
Summary: "I wanted to talk to you about Andy," Pam says, handing me a glass. "Why?" "Because your face lit up when I said his name." Extremely AU. Rated T for major character death and minor mentions of self harm.


_I once knew this guy. His name was Andy and he made me extremely happy. Being with him made me happier than I've ever been in my life. He was sweet and funny and nice and then one day, I guess he stopped being the Andy I knew and loved. He became a totally different guy. I think maybe everything inside of him broke for the last time. He once told me that everything fell apart every few months and he could never control it or stop it from happening, but when I was around they stayed together a little longer. We met when I was a freshman and he was a sophomore and he was assigned to show me around school._

"Hi, I'm Erin!" I introduce to the slightly older boy who's standing in front of me. He's wearing a corduroy blazer and a bowtie, which would normally make someone look pretentious but it suits him.

"Andy." He wears his smile better than his bowtie.

"Are you a sophomore or a junior?" I ask, not because I'm particularly interested in his answer, but because I want to talk to him.

"Sophomore."

"So, you like one word answers?" I ask with a smirk.

"Yep."

"Come on!"

"Okay. Yes, I do like one word answers. I don't see the need for unneccesarily long sentences like this one," he says and I feel my heart beat a little bit faster. "What's your first class?"

And before I can answer, Andy's snatched my timetable from my hand and started reading it. "English with Mrs. Begg. She's a total bitch, you don't wanna get on her wrong side."

I nod and laugh a little. "I've got that for first period as well, but we have different classes until fourth period lunch. Then we've got a few more classes together, but not enough for me to be able to help you with everything. You can sit next to me."

_And that's how I came to be friends with Andy Bernard._

.

"This is Erin, she's a freshman," Andy says to his friends at lunch, pointing to me. There's a guy with sort of long hair, a girl with curly red hair, a small blonde girl and a tall guy with a massive forehead. "Erin, these are my friends—Jim, Pam, Angela and Dwight."

"Nice to meet you all," I shake all of their hands and smile. Andy puts his hand on the small of my back and pulls me closer to him. I don't think anyone but me notices.

Pam and Jim are the nice ones of the group. They're all sophomores, like Andy, and Pam and Jim are definitely the nice ones. Dwight's downright annoying and Angela criticises everything. I think they're secretly together, but nobody seems to be picking up on it but me. Or maybe it's not a secret and they're just not overly affectionate. She doesn't like that, I don't think.

.

Okay, so I may have a tiny crush on Andy. Like, the tiniest. He's just very sweet. Like, the other day we were hanging out at Jim's house and I spilled water all over myself and he gave me his jacket and he let me sit on his lap until my brother Reed came to pick me up. He kissed me on the cheek when we were saying goodbye. I'm at Pam's house right now, she invited me over so we could speak about something.

"Hey," she says, coming back into her room holding two glasses of Coke.

"Hi!"

"I wanted to talk to you about Andy," Pam says, handing me a glass.

"Why?"

"Because your face lit up when I said his name."

Oh, shit. I'm in for it now.

"No, it didn't," I say, but it's no use. Pam has this way of making people talk. She just looks at you and does this thing where she upturns one of the corners of her lips without smiling and shrugs. Oddly, it makes you want to spill. "Okay, yes, I like Andy a little."

"I knew it!" she shouts and points at me. "But seriously, all jokes aside, I think he likes you too."

"Really?" I ask, and I must be blushing like crazy because Pam's grinning at me.

"Yep."

.

I'm sitting in Andy's car. It is ten thirty at night and I am sitting outside of my house in a car with a boy that I'm probably falling for and I don't want to go back inside and something tells me he doesn't want me to either. He's looking at me with his head tilted back ever-so-slightly and there's that smile on his face that he had when we first met. Over the six months that I've known him, his smile has stopped appearing so frequently and has basically disappeared now, but it's okay because it's back.

"Erin?" I look at him and his eyes are sparkling, something I haven't seen in a really long time.

"Yeah?"

"You look very pretty tonight."

"Thanks, Andy," I say and I try to pass it off as no big deal.

He leans toward me and smiles. "You look pretty every night," his voice feels sweet on my neck.

And then he kisses me and it's like something out of a movie. Not the world war III and fireworks shit, but like a movie all the same. That was the very first time I ever got a hickey.

.

On our first date, Andy takes me to his house. He makes me tagliatelle pasta because I once told him I loved it but my foster home would never let me have it. We kiss a little more that night.

"Andy?"

"Yeah?"

"You look very handsome tonight."

"Thanks, Erin."

"You look handsome every night."

_At that time, I guess I was okay with reverse conversations and pasta and kissing. I had no idea that it would end so suddenly. Or at all, for that matter._

.

"You and Andy are a thing," Pam observes when we sit down for precalc.

"Kind of. We've been on a few dates, but it's not official," I say.

"Have you kissed? Is that a _hickey_?" I nod in response to both of her questions.

Angela comes in with Dwight by her side—they're mumbling something I can't make out—and he's looking at her the way I see Jim look at Pam. They spot us and come over to the table and we talk until the teacher comes in.

.

"Hey, babe," Andy says, kissing my cheek. I love the way he says babe, like it rolls off of his tongue.

"Hey," I say and I take his hand.

"We still on for tonight?"

"Yeah," and I smile at him like nothing's wrong.

.

"Where are you?" I say into the phone.

"I'm sorry," he says.

"What's wrong? Andy, where are you?"

"I'm sorry," he repeats.

"Andy, you're scaring me."

"I'm so, so sorry."

"What've you done? Andy, have you been _crying_?"

"I can't do this, Erin. I'm sorry," he hangs up without any explanation.

.

"Andy, are you alright?" I ask and I hug him as soon as I see him. He doesn't hug me back, but I can feel him burying his head in my hair.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Sorry, I got a little crazy. I'm fine."

I don't believe him, but I leave it. "Hey, Erin?"

"Yeah?"

"I love you."

That day, I see the scars on his wrists for the first time. I shouldn't of left it.

.

It's the middle of the night when I first get the call. I'm asleep when my phone rings, and the name _Angela _is written across the screen, and that's weird because... well, it's _Angela_. And that's when I know. I almost don't pick up, but I have to.

"Hi."

"Hey, Erin—"

"It's Andy, isn't it?" I ask.

There's a silence, and then, "yes. I'm sorry. He was drunk and he didn't—"

"Yeah. God. My boyfriend's dead. My boyfriend's dead. _My boyfriend's dead_," I repeat over and over again.

"I'm so—"

But I don't let her finish. I hang up before I start crying, because I don't want her to hear me break down. I turn my lamp on and I start crying as quietly as I can, because I don't want to wake Reed. He hears me, though, because five minutes later I'm sobbing into his sweater and he's rocking me back and forth.

.

The funeral is three days later, and Jim and Pam show up together, as do Dwight and Angela. His mom and dad and brother and sister and the rest of his family sit up front, and I kindly decline the offer to sit with them, because that makes this way too real. They read out all of his accomplishments and then the eulogies come, and people are looking at me because they just _knew_. And as his brother's reading out Andy's sixth grade diary and everyone's laughing except me, it's too much. Because I remember all of the holding hands while he drives and all of the stolen kisses and the hickeys and the hugs and wow, _my boyfriend is dead and he's never coming back_. So, I get up and mumble something to Pam and I leave and I'm breathing heavily. I feel a hand on my shoulder, one I eventually identify as Jim's, and an arm around me.

"Jim?" I ask, panting.

"Yeah?" he says softly.

"Did he love me?" It's stupid. I know he did. He said it.

"No doubt about it," he says without hesitation. In the wind, Jim squints at me. "Sometimes he talked about you. When you first met. We all met up at the weekend and he was like "Erin's so cool, wow, you should be more like Erin." It was annoying."

I laugh and then feel guilty and stop. "Why did he do it?"

"Because even though he loved you, he could never love himself."

"But I love him," I say and lean into Jim's chest.

"I know you do. And man, Erin, he loved you so much. He loved you so much that it hurts me to think about it. It makes me upset to think of the way he would talk about you, how he would make you seem like you're perfect. He would romanticise everything about you, but not in a bad way. He used to space out on conversations after we first met you, and he would sneak glances at you while you were working and he... you made him happier than any of us ever could," he says.

"If he loved me so much, why did he do it? He left me. He left me, and I know that's selfish as hell, but _he left me_. And it hurts," I cry.

"I know. I know he did. And it's not selfish, even though he left all of us too, because you're right. He left _you_. You. He left you. He left you," Jim says. He keeps repeating himself and repeating himself like he's a broken record.

"He left you, too. You were his best friend. Are you okay?" I ask.

"No."

"Yeah. Yeah, right. God. He's gone. It's over."

"And it's over for real this time. He's gone. He left you. It's over. He's gone. He's gone, he's gone, _he's gone_."

And this time, I'm holding him as he cries into my only black dress and mumbles the words _he's gone _over and over again. Pam comes out about ten minutes later looking for us both, and she takes over the comforting duty by letting us both cry onto her shoulders.

.

It's been a year since he died. May 15th. I never forgot him. I met this guy called Pete and he makes me laugh and I make him laugh, but I don't see it going anywhere. He doesn't wear corduroy blazers or bowties or sing a capella and his name isn't Andy. He doesn't like one word answers or make me tagliatelle pasta or tell me that I look pretty every night. It's okay. It's not okay. I don't know. Pam and Jim are together now and I'm a sophomore and Dwight and Angela are officially together and me and Pete are a thing, but... it's just different.

"Hey, Erin?" Jim says, looking up from his turkey sandwich.

"Yeah?"

"It's gonna be okay. You know that, right?" he says and I nod, but I'm not too sure.

"I guess."

"It will," Jim says and he's so certain of it, I believe him for a minute. "What've you got to eat today?"

"Tagliatelle."


End file.
